The Mir mine (Russian: Кимберлитовая алмазная трубка «Мир»Kimberlitovaya Almaznaya Trubka "Mir"; English: kimberlitediamond pipe "Peace"), also called the Mirny mine, is an open pitdiamond mine located in Mirny, Sakha Republic, in the Siberian region of eastern Russia. The mine is 525 metres deep (1722.44 feet) (4th in the world) and has a diameter of 1,200 m (3,900 ft),[1] and is one of the largest excavated holes in the world.

Open-pit mining was discontinued in 2001, since 2009, it has been active as an underground diamond mine.[2]

Contents

The diamond-bearing deposits were discovered on June 13, 1955, by Soviet geologists Yuri Khabardin, Ekaterina Elagina and Viktor Avdeenko during the large Amakinsky Expedition in Yakut ASSR, they found traces of the volcanic rock kimberlite, which is usually associated with diamonds. This finding was the second success in the search for kimberlite in Russia, after numerous failed expeditions of the 1940s and 1950s. (The first was Zarnitsa mine, 1954.) For this discovery, in 1957 Khabardin was given the Lenin Prize, one of the highest awards in the Soviet Union.[3][4]

The development of the mine started in 1957, in extremely harsh climate conditions. Seven months of winter per year froze the ground, making it hard to mine, during the brief summer months, the ground turned to slush. Buildings had to be raised on piles, so that they would not sink from the warmth of the building melting the permafrost, the main processing plant had to be built on better ground, found 20 km away from the mine. The winter temperatures were so low that car tires and steel would shatter and oil would freeze, during the winter, workers used jet engines to thaw and dig out the permafrost or blasted it with dynamite to get access to the underlying kimberlite. The entire mine had to be covered at night to prevent the machinery from freezing.[5][6]

In the 1960s the mine was producing 10,000,000 carats (2,000 kg) of diamond per year, of which a relatively high fraction (20%) were of gem quality.[5] The upper layers of the mine (down to 340 metres) had very high diamond content of 4 carats (0.80 g) per tonne of ore, with the relatively high ratio of gems to industrial stones. The yield decreased to about 2 carats (0.40 g) per tonne and the production rate slowed to 2,000,000 carats (400 kg) per year near the pit bottom. The largest diamond of the mine was found on 23 December 1980; it weighed 342.5 carats (68 g) and was named "26th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union" (Russian: XXVI съезд КПСС). The mine operation was interrupted in the 1990s at a depth of 340 m after the pit bottom became flooded, but resumed later.[7][8]

The rapid development of the Mir mine had worried De Beers company, which at that time was distributing most of the world's diamonds. De Beers had to buy Russian diamonds in order to control the market price, and therefore needed to know as much as possible about the Russian mining developments; in the 1970s, De Beers requested permission to visit the Mir mine. Permission was granted under condition that Russian experts would visit De Beers diamond mines in South Africa. De Beers executive Sir Philip Oppenheimer and chief geologist Barry Hawthorne arrived in Moscow in the summer of 1976, they were intentionally delayed in Moscow by the arrangement of a series of meetings and lavish banquets with Soviet geologists, mineralogists, engineers and mine managers. When Oppenheimer and Hawthorne finally reached the Mir mine, their visas were about to expire, so that they could only have 20 minutes at the Mir mine. Even that short time was sufficient to get some important details, for example, the Russians did not use water during the ore processing at all, which was astonishing to De Beers. The reason was that water would freeze most of the year, and dry crushing was used instead. De Beers also overestimated the size of the mine's pit.[9]

The Mir mine was the first developed and the largest diamond mine in the Soviet Union,[10] its surface operation lasted 44 years, finally closing in June 2001.[8] After the collapse of the USSR, in the 1990s, the mine was operated by the Sakha diamond company, which reported annual profits in excess of $600 million from diamond sales.[11]

Later, the mine was operated by Alrosa, the largest diamond producing company in Russia, and employed 3,600 workers, it had long been anticipated that the recovery of diamonds by conventional surface mining would end. Therefore, in the 1970s construction of a network of tunnels for underground diamond recovery began. By 1999, the project operated exclusively as an underground mine; in order to stabilize the abandoned surface main pit, its bottom was covered by a rubble layer 45 metres thick.[1] After underground operations began, the project had a mine life estimate of 27 years, based on a drilling exploration program to a depth of 1,220 metres. Production ceased in 2004,[12] and the Mir mine was permanently closed in 2011.[13][14]

The mine was commissioned again in 2009, and is expected to remain operational for 50 more years.[2]

1.
Mirny, Sakha Republic
–
Mirny is a town and the administrative center of Mirninsky District in the Sakha Republic, Russia, located on the Irelyakh River,820 kilometers west of Yakutsk, the capital of the republic. As of the 2010 Census, its population was 37,188, Mirny was founded in 1955 after the discovery of a nearby kimberlite pipe by an expedition led by Yury Khabardin. Town status was granted to it in 1959, within the framework of administrative divisions, Mirny serves as the administrative center of Mirninsky District. As an inhabited locality, Mirny is classified as a town under republic jurisdiction, as an administrative division, it is incorporated within Mirninsky District as the Town of Mirny. As a municipal division, the Town of Mirny is incorporated within Mirninsky Municipal District as Mirny Urban Settlement, the Mir mine is located within the town. It is a pit mine, which, with the depth of 525 meters. Production was stopped in 2004, and the mine was closed in 2011, due to reduced recovery. The town is served by the Mirny Airport, safety concerns have been raised about aircraft operations near to the open diamond mine, helicopters are forbidden to pass over the abandoned workings. The Mirny Polytechnic Institute, a branch of the North-Eastern Federal University, Official website of Mirny Official website of the Sakha Republic. Registry of the Administrative-Territorial Divisions of the Sakha Republic, Закон №172-З №351-III от30 ноября2004 г. «Об установлении границ и о наделении статусом муниципального района муниципальных образований Республики Саха », в ред, Закона №1535-З №597-V от27 ноября2015 г. «О внесении изменений в статьи1 и2 Закона Республики Саха Об установлении границ и о наделении статусом муниципального района муниципальных образований Республики Саха », Вступил в силу со дня официального опубликования. Опубликован, Якутия, №245,31 декабря2004 г, Закон №173-З №353-III от30 ноября2004 г. «Об установлении границ и о наделении статусом городского и сельского поселений муниципальных образований Республики Саха », в ред, Закона №1058-З №1007-IV от25 апреля2012 г. «О внесении изменений в Закон Республики Саха Об установлении границ и о наделении статусом городского и сельского поселений муниципальных образований Республики Саха », Вступил в силу со дня официального опубликования. Опубликован, Якутия, №245,31 декабря2004 г

2.
Sakha Republic
–
The Sakha Republic is a federal subject of Russia. It has a population of 958,528, consisting mainly of ethnic Yakuts and it is larger than Argentina and just smaller than India which covers an area of 3,287,590 square kilometers. Its capital is the city of Yakutsk, the Sakha Republic is one of the ten autonomous Turkic Republics within the Russian Federation. The hypercontinental tendencies also result in warm summers for much of the republic. Borders, internal, Chukotka Autonomous Okrug, Magadan Oblast, Khabarovsk Krai, Amur Oblast, Zabaykalsky Krai, Irkutsk Oblast, Krasnoyarsk Krai. water, Arctic Ocean. These waters, the coldest and iciest of all seas in the Northern Hemisphere, are covered by ice for 9–10 months of the year, new Siberian Islands are a part of the republics territory. Sakha can be divided into three great vegetation belts, about 40% of Sakha lies above the Arctic circle and all of it is covered by permafrost which greatly influences the regions ecology and limits forests in the southern region. Arctic and subarctic tundra define the region, where lichen. In the southern part of the belt, scattered stands of dwarf Siberian pine. Below the tundra is the vast taiga forest region, larch trees dominate in the north and stands of fir and pine begin to appear in the south. Taiga forests cover about 47% of Sakha and almost 90% of the cover is larch, Sakha spans three time zones, Yakutsk Time Zone. Covers the republics territory to the west of the Lena River as well as the territories of the located on the both sides of the Lena River. Covers most of the territory located between 127°E and 140°E longitude. Covers most of the territory located east of 140°E longitude. Districts, Abyysky, Allaikhovsky, Momsky, Nizhnekolymsky, Srednekolymsky, Verkhnekolymsky, the Chersky Range runs east of the Verkhoyansk Range and has the highest peak in Sakha, Peak Pobeda. The second highest peak is Peak Mus-Khaya reaching 3,011 m, the Stanovoi Range borders Sakha in the south. Sakha is well endowed with raw materials, the soil contains large reserves of oil, gas, coal, diamonds, gold, silver, tin, tungsten and many others. Sakha produces 99% of all Russian diamonds and over 25% of the diamonds mined in the world, Sakha is known for its climate extremes, with the Verkhoyansk Range being the coldest area in the Northern Hemisphere

3.
Siberia
–
Siberia is an extensive geographical region, and by the broadest definition is also known as North Asia. Siberia has historically been a part of Russia since the 17th century, the territory of Siberia extends eastwards from the Ural Mountains to the watershed between the Pacific and Arctic drainage basins. It stretches southwards from the Arctic Ocean to the hills of north-central Kazakhstan and to the borders of Mongolia. With an area of 13.1 million square kilometres, Siberia accounts for 77% of Russias land area and this is equivalent to an average population density of about 3 inhabitants per square kilometre, making Siberia one of the most sparsely populated regions on Earth. If it were a country by itself, it would still be the largest country in area, the origin of the name is unknown. Some sources say that Siberia originates from the Siberian Tatar word for sleeping land, another account sees the name as the ancient tribal ethnonym of the Sirtya, a folk, which spoke a language that later evolved into the Ugric languages. This ethnic group was assimilated to the Siberian Tatar people. The modern usage of the name was recorded in the Russian language after the Empires conquest of the Siberian Khanate, a further variant claims that the region was named after the Xibe people. The Polish historian Chycliczkowski has proposed that the name derives from the word for north. He said that the neighbouring Chinese, Arabs and Mongolians would not have known Russian and he suggests that the name is a combination of two words, su and bir. The region is of significance, as it contains bodies of prehistoric animals from the Pleistocene Epoch. Specimens of Goldfuss cave lion cubs, Yuka and another woolly mammoth from Oymyakon, a rhinoceros from the Kolyma River. The Siberian Traps were formed by one of the largest known volcanic events of the last 500 million years of Earths geological history. They continued for a million years and are considered a cause of the Great Dying about 250 million years ago. At least three species of human lived in Southern Siberia around 40,000 years ago, H. sapiens, H. neanderthalensis, the last was determined in 2010, by DNA evidence, to be a new species. Siberia was inhabited by different groups of such as the Enets, the Nenets, the Huns, the Scythians. The Khan of Sibir in the vicinity of modern Tobolsk was known as a prominent figure who endorsed Kubrat as Khagan of Old Great Bulgaria in 630, the Mongols conquered a large part of this area early in the 13th century. With the breakup of the Golden Horde, the autonomous Khanate of Sibir was established in the late 15th century, turkic-speaking Yakut migrated north from the Lake Baikal region under pressure from the Mongol tribes during the 13th to 15th century

4.
Russia
–
Russia, also officially the Russian Federation, is a country in Eurasia. The European western part of the country is more populated and urbanised than the eastern. Russias capital Moscow is one of the largest cities in the world, other urban centers include Saint Petersburg, Novosibirsk, Yekaterinburg, Nizhny Novgorod. Extending across the entirety of Northern Asia and much of Eastern Europe, Russia spans eleven time zones and incorporates a range of environments. It shares maritime borders with Japan by the Sea of Okhotsk, the East Slavs emerged as a recognizable group in Europe between the 3rd and 8th centuries AD. Founded and ruled by a Varangian warrior elite and their descendants, in 988 it adopted Orthodox Christianity from the Byzantine Empire, beginning the synthesis of Byzantine and Slavic cultures that defined Russian culture for the next millennium. Rus ultimately disintegrated into a number of states, most of the Rus lands were overrun by the Mongol invasion. The Soviet Union played a role in the Allied victory in World War II. The Soviet era saw some of the most significant technological achievements of the 20th century, including the worlds first human-made satellite and the launching of the first humans in space. By the end of 1990, the Soviet Union had the second largest economy, largest standing military in the world. It is governed as a federal semi-presidential republic, the Russian economy ranks as the twelfth largest by nominal GDP and sixth largest by purchasing power parity in 2015. Russias extensive mineral and energy resources are the largest such reserves in the world, making it one of the producers of oil. The country is one of the five recognized nuclear weapons states and possesses the largest stockpile of weapons of mass destruction, Russia is a great power as well as a regional power and has been characterised as a potential superpower. The name Russia is derived from Rus, a state populated mostly by the East Slavs. However, this name became more prominent in the later history, and the country typically was called by its inhabitants Русская Земля. In order to distinguish this state from other states derived from it, it is denoted as Kievan Rus by modern historiography, an old Latin version of the name Rus was Ruthenia, mostly applied to the western and southern regions of Rus that were adjacent to Catholic Europe. The current name of the country, Россия, comes from the Byzantine Greek designation of the Kievan Rus, the standard way to refer to citizens of Russia is Russians in English and rossiyane in Russian. There are two Russian words which are translated into English as Russians

5.
Geographic coordinate system
–
A geographic coordinate system is a coordinate system used in geography that enables every location on Earth to be specified by a set of numbers, letters or symbols. The coordinates are chosen such that one of the numbers represents a vertical position. A common choice of coordinates is latitude, longitude and elevation, to specify a location on a two-dimensional map requires a map projection. The invention of a coordinate system is generally credited to Eratosthenes of Cyrene. Ptolemy credited him with the adoption of longitude and latitude. Ptolemys 2nd-century Geography used the prime meridian but measured latitude from the equator instead. Mathematical cartography resumed in Europe following Maximus Planudes recovery of Ptolemys text a little before 1300, in 1884, the United States hosted the International Meridian Conference, attended by representatives from twenty-five nations. Twenty-two of them agreed to adopt the longitude of the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, the Dominican Republic voted against the motion, while France and Brazil abstained. France adopted Greenwich Mean Time in place of local determinations by the Paris Observatory in 1911, the latitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle between the equatorial plane and the straight line that passes through that point and through the center of the Earth. Lines joining points of the same latitude trace circles on the surface of Earth called parallels, as they are parallel to the equator, the north pole is 90° N, the south pole is 90° S. The 0° parallel of latitude is designated the equator, the plane of all geographic coordinate systems. The equator divides the globe into Northern and Southern Hemispheres, the longitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle east or west of a reference meridian to another meridian that passes through that point. All meridians are halves of great ellipses, which converge at the north and south poles, the prime meridian determines the proper Eastern and Western Hemispheres, although maps often divide these hemispheres further west in order to keep the Old World on a single side. The antipodal meridian of Greenwich is both 180°W and 180°E, the combination of these two components specifies the position of any location on the surface of Earth, without consideration of altitude or depth. The grid formed by lines of latitude and longitude is known as a graticule, the origin/zero point of this system is located in the Gulf of Guinea about 625 km south of Tema, Ghana. To completely specify a location of a feature on, in, or above Earth. Earth is not a sphere, but a shape approximating a biaxial ellipsoid. It is nearly spherical, but has an equatorial bulge making the radius at the equator about 0. 3% larger than the radius measured through the poles, the shorter axis approximately coincides with the axis of rotation

6.
Alrosa
–
Alrosa is a Russian group of diamond mining companies that has the leading role in the world diamond mining by volume. Alrosa is engaged in the exploration, mining, manufacture and sale of diamonds, mining takes place in Western Yakutia, Russia, the Arkhangelsk region, Russia and Africa. The Russian Federation is the largest diamond-producing nation in the world, Alrosa is the leading company accounting for 95% of countrys production and 28% of the global diamond extraction. Alrosa has the world’s largest rough diamond reserves, sufficient for at least another 18–20 years of production, full title, Public joint stock company Alrosa, short title, PJSC Alrosa. The companys headquarters are in Mirny and Moscow, the history of Alrosa dates back to 1954, when the first primary deposit of diamonds in the Soviet Union, the kimberlite pipe Zarnitsa, was found. In 1955 the Mir kimberlite pipe and the Udachnaya pipe were discovered, a total of fifteen primary diamond sources were found in 1955. In 1957, a decision was made to begin mining and production operations on alluvial, to manage the facilities construction and subsequent operations, the Yakutalmaz group of companies was established with headquarters in Mirny. The first commercial-grade diamonds were recovered the same year, two years later, the Soviet Union sold the first shipment of diamonds on the world market. For the most part during the Soviet period, the mining industry developed on the basis of the Mir open-pit mine. In those years its main open-pit mines, processing plants and related energy generating facilities were put into operation, in 1960, the Djomolungma and Chimyan was discovered, and in 1969, the International kimberlite pipe. In 1963, the first sales contracts between the USSR and De Beers group were signed, in 2009 this cooperation was brought to an end as contrary to European Union competition laws in compliance with a decision of the European Commission. Now Alrosa independently distributes its rough diamond production on the world market, through 1980, rapid development of primary deposits continued in Aikhal township on the basis of the Jubilee pipe and in Udachny town. Today the Udachny open-pit mine is one of the largest open-pit mines in the world, in 2011, Alrosa was reorganized as an open joint-stock company with free float of Alrosa’s shares on financial markets. In July 2007, Verkhne-Munskoye diamond field in Yakutia was discovered with estimated value of about $3.5 billion. In August 2009, during the recent financial crisis, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin announced the Russian government, via Gokhran and this was to support the Russian diamond mining industry while avoiding saturation in the global diamond market and thus further depression of diamond prices. The diamond mining industry is critical to the Yakutia economy,28 October 2013 the Company carried out the IPO. The Russian government and the Republic of Sakha sold a combined 14% stake, U. S. investors were the biggest buyers of the shares, purchasing up to 60% of the stake, 24% got European investors, Russian investors accounted for about 14%. Investment funds Oppenheimer Funds Inc. and Lazard Ltd. took part in the IPO, Alrosa raised $1.3 billion in share sales

7.
Russian language
–
Russian is an East Slavic language and an official language in Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and many minor or unrecognised territories. Russian belongs to the family of Indo-European languages and is one of the four living members of the East Slavic languages, written examples of Old East Slavonic are attested from the 10th century and beyond. It is the most geographically widespread language of Eurasia and the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages and it is also the largest native language in Europe, with 144 million native speakers in Russia, Ukraine and Belarus. Russian is the eighth most spoken language in the world by number of native speakers, the language is one of the six official languages of the United Nations. Russian is also the second most widespread language on the Internet after English, Russian distinguishes between consonant phonemes with palatal secondary articulation and those without, the so-called soft and hard sounds. This distinction is found between pairs of almost all consonants and is one of the most distinguishing features of the language, another important aspect is the reduction of unstressed vowels. Russian is a Slavic language of the Indo-European family and it is a lineal descendant of the language used in Kievan Rus. From the point of view of the language, its closest relatives are Ukrainian, Belarusian, and Rusyn. An East Slavic Old Novgorod dialect, although vanished during the 15th or 16th century, is considered to have played a significant role in the formation of modern Russian. In the 19th century, the language was often called Great Russian to distinguish it from Belarusian, then called White Russian and Ukrainian, however, the East Slavic forms have tended to be used exclusively in the various dialects that are experiencing a rapid decline. In some cases, both the East Slavic and the Church Slavonic forms are in use, with different meanings. For details, see Russian phonology and History of the Russian language and it is also regarded by the United States Intelligence Community as a hard target language, due to both its difficulty to master for English speakers and its critical role in American world policy. The standard form of Russian is generally regarded as the modern Russian literary language, mikhail Lomonosov first compiled a normalizing grammar book in 1755, in 1783 the Russian Academys first explanatory Russian dictionary appeared. By the mid-20th century, such dialects were forced out with the introduction of the education system that was established by the Soviet government. Despite the formalization of Standard Russian, some nonstandard dialectal features are observed in colloquial speech. Thus, the Russian language is the 6th largest in the world by number of speakers, after English, Mandarin, Hindi/Urdu, Spanish, Russian is one of the six official languages of the United Nations. Education in Russian is still a choice for both Russian as a second language and native speakers in Russia as well as many of the former Soviet republics. Russian is still seen as an important language for children to learn in most of the former Soviet republics, samuel P. Huntington wrote in the Clash of Civilizations, During the heyday of the Soviet Union, Russian was the lingua franca from Prague to Hanoi

8.
Kimberlite
–
Kimberlite is an igneous rock best known for sometimes containing diamonds. Kimberlite occurs in the Earths crust in vertical structures known as kimberlite pipes as well as igneous dykes, Kimberlite also occurs as horizontal sills. Kimberlite pipes are the most important source of mined diamonds today, the consensus on kimberlites is that they are formed deep within the mantle. It is this depth of melting and generation which makes kimberlites prone to hosting diamond xenocrysts, despite its relative rarity, kimberlite has attracted attention because it serves as a carrier of diamonds and garnet peridotite mantle xenoliths to the Earths surface. Many kimberlite structures are emplaced as carrot-shaped, vertical intrusions termed pipes, Kimberlite classification is based on the recognition of differing rock facies. These differing facies are associated with a style of magmatic activity, namely crater, diatreme. The morphology of kimberlite pipes, and their classical carrot shape is the result of explosive volcanism from very deep mantle-derived sources. These volcanic explosions produce vertical columns of rock rise from deep magma reservoirs. The morphology of kimberlite pipes is varied but includes a sheeted dyke complex of tabular, within 1. 5–2 km of the surface, the highly pressured magma explodes upwards and expands to form a conical to cylindrical diatreme, which erupts to the surface. The surface expression is rarely preserved but is similar to a maar volcano. The diameter of a pipe at the surface is typically a few hundred meters to a kilometer. Two Jurassic kimberlite dikes exist in Pennsylvania, one, the Gates-Adah Dike, outcrops on the Monongahela River on the border of Fayette and Greene Counties. The other, the Dixonville-Tanoma Dike in central Indiana County, does not outcrop at the surface and was discovered by miners, similarly aged kimberlite is found in several locations in New York Both the location and origin of kimberlitic magmas are subjects of contention. The mechanism of enrichment has also been the topic of interest with models including partial melting, historically, kimberlites have been classified into two distinct varieties termed basaltic and micaceous based primarily on petrographic observations. This was later revised by Smith who renamed these divisions Group I and Group II based on the affinities of these rocks using the Nd, Sr. Mitchell later proposed that these group I and II kimberlites display such distinct differences and he showed that Group II kimberlites show closer affinities to lamproites than they do to Group I kimberlites. Hence, he reclassified Group II kimberlites as orangeites to prevent confusion, olivine lamproites were previously called Group II kimberlite or orangeite in response to the mistaken belief that they only occurred in South Africa. Their occurrence and petrology, however, are identical globally and should not be referred to as kimberlite

9.
Diamond
–
Diamond is a metastable allotrope of carbon, where the carbon atoms are arranged in a variation of the face-centered cubic crystal structure called a diamond lattice. Diamond is less stable than graphite, but the rate from diamond to graphite is negligible at standard conditions. Diamond is renowned as a material with superlative physical qualities, most of which originate from the covalent bonding between its atoms. In particular, diamond has the highest hardness and thermal conductivity of any bulk material and those properties determine the major industrial application of diamond in cutting and polishing tools and the scientific applications in diamond knives and diamond anvil cells. Because of its extremely rigid lattice, it can be contaminated by very few types of impurities, such as boron, small amounts of defects or impurities color diamond blue, yellow, brown, green, purple, pink, orange or red. Diamond also has relatively high optical dispersion, most natural diamonds are formed at high temperature and pressure at depths of 140 to 190 kilometers in the Earths mantle. Carbon-containing minerals provide the source, and the growth occurs over periods from 1 billion to 3.3 billion years. Diamonds are brought close to the Earths surface through deep volcanic eruptions by magma, Diamonds can also be produced synthetically in a HPHT method which approximately simulates the conditions in the Earths mantle. An alternative, and completely different growth technique is chemical vapor deposition, several non-diamond materials, which include cubic zirconia and silicon carbide and are often called diamond simulants, resemble diamond in appearance and many properties. Special gemological techniques have developed to distinguish natural diamonds, synthetic diamonds. The word is from the ancient Greek ἀδάμας – adámas unbreakable, the name diamond is derived from the ancient Greek αδάμας, proper, unalterable, unbreakable, untamed, from ἀ-, un- + δαμάω, I overpower, I tame. Diamonds have been known in India for at least 3,000 years, Diamonds have been treasured as gemstones since their use as religious icons in ancient India. Their usage in engraving tools also dates to early human history, later in 1797, the English chemist Smithson Tennant repeated and expanded that experiment. By demonstrating that burning diamond and graphite releases the same amount of gas, the most familiar uses of diamonds today are as gemstones used for adornment, a use which dates back into antiquity, and as industrial abrasives for cutting hard materials. The dispersion of light into spectral colors is the primary gemological characteristic of gem diamonds. In the 20th century, experts in gemology developed methods of grading diamonds, four characteristics, known informally as the four Cs, are now commonly used as the basic descriptors of diamonds, these are carat, cut, color, and clarity. A large, flawless diamond is known as a paragon and these conditions are met in two places on Earth, in the lithospheric mantle below relatively stable continental plates, and at the site of a meteorite strike. The conditions for diamond formation to happen in the mantle occur at considerable depth corresponding to the requirements of temperature and pressure

10.
Open-pit mining
–
Open-pit, open-cast or open cut mining is a surface mining technique of extracting rock or minerals from the earth by their removal from an open pit or borrow. This form of mining differs from extractive methods that require tunneling into the earth, for minerals that occur deep below the surface—where the overburden is thick or the mineral occurs as veins in hard rock—underground mining methods are used to extract the valued material. Open-pit mines that produce building materials and dimension stone are commonly referred to as quarries, open-pit mines are typically enlarged until either the mineral resource is exhausted, or an increasing ratio of overburden to ore makes further mining uneconomic. When this occurs, the mines are sometimes converted to landfills for disposal of solid wastes. Open-cast mines are dug on benches, which describe vertical levels of the hole and these benches are usually on four to sixty meter intervals, depending on the size of the machinery that is being used. Many quarries do not use benches, as they are usually shallow, most walls of the pit are generally blast mined on an angle less than vertical, to prevent and minimize damage and danger from rock falls. This depends on how weathered the rocks are, and the type of rock, the inclined section of the wall is known as the batter, and the flat part of the step is known as the bench or berm. The steps in the walls help prevent rock falls continuing down the face of the wall. In some instances additional ground support is required and rock bolts, cable bolts, de-watering bores may be used to relieve water pressure by drilling horizontally into the wall, which is often enough to cause failures in the wall by itself. A haul road is situated at the side of the pit, forming a ramp up which trucks can drive, carrying ore. Waste rock is piled up at the surface, near the edge of the open pit and this is known as the waste dump. The waste dump is also tiered and stepped, to minimize degradation, ore which has been processed is known as tailings, and is generally a slurry. This is pumped to a dam or settling pond, where the water evaporates. This toxicity can harm the surrounding environment, after mining finishes, the mine area may undergo land rehabilitation. Waste dumps are contoured to flatten out, to further stabilise them. This is then covered with soil, and vegetation is planted to help consolidate the material. There are no long term studies on the success of these due to the relatively short time in which large scale open pit mining has existed. It may take hundreds to thousands of years for some waste dumps to become acid neutral, the dumps are usually fenced off to prevent livestock denuding them of vegetation

11.
Soviet Union
–
The Soviet Union, officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was a socialist state in Eurasia that existed from 1922 to 1991. It was nominally a union of national republics, but its government. The Soviet Union had its roots in the October Revolution of 1917 and this established the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic and started the Russian Civil War between the revolutionary Reds and the counter-revolutionary Whites. In 1922, the communists were victorious, forming the Soviet Union with the unification of the Russian, Transcaucasian, Ukrainian, following Lenins death in 1924, a collective leadership and a brief power struggle, Joseph Stalin came to power in the mid-1920s. Stalin suppressed all opposition to his rule, committed the state ideology to Marxism–Leninism. As a result, the country underwent a period of rapid industrialization and collectivization which laid the foundation for its victory in World War II and postwar dominance of Eastern Europe. Shortly before World War II, Stalin signed the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact agreeing to non-aggression with Nazi Germany, in June 1941, the Germans invaded the Soviet Union, opening the largest and bloodiest theater of war in history. Soviet war casualties accounted for the highest proportion of the conflict in the effort of acquiring the upper hand over Axis forces at battles such as Stalingrad. Soviet forces eventually captured Berlin in 1945, the territory overtaken by the Red Army became satellite states of the Eastern Bloc. The Cold War emerged by 1947 as the Soviet bloc confronted the Western states that united in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in 1949. Following Stalins death in 1953, a period of political and economic liberalization, known as de-Stalinization and Khrushchevs Thaw, the country developed rapidly, as millions of peasants were moved into industrialized cities. The USSR took a lead in the Space Race with Sputnik 1, the first ever satellite, and Vostok 1. In the 1970s, there was a brief détente of relations with the United States, the war drained economic resources and was matched by an escalation of American military aid to Mujahideen fighters. In the mid-1980s, the last Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev, sought to reform and liberalize the economy through his policies of glasnost. The goal was to preserve the Communist Party while reversing the economic stagnation, the Cold War ended during his tenure, and in 1989 Soviet satellite countries in Eastern Europe overthrew their respective communist regimes. This led to the rise of strong nationalist and separatist movements inside the USSR as well, in August 1991, a coup détat was attempted by Communist Party hardliners. It failed, with Russian President Boris Yeltsin playing a role in facing down the coup. On 25 December 1991, Gorbachev resigned and the twelve constituent republics emerged from the dissolution of the Soviet Union as independent post-Soviet states

12.
Lenin Prize
–
The Lenin Prize was one of the most prestigious awards of the Soviet Union, presented to individuals for accomplishments relating to science, literature, arts, architecture, and technology. It was created on June 23,1925 and was awarded until 1934, during the period from 1935 to 1956, the Lenin Prize was not awarded, being replaced largely by the Stalin Prize. On August 15,1956, it was reestablished, and continued to be awarded on every even-numbered year until 1990, the award ceremony was April 22, Lenins birthday. The Lenin Prize is different from the Lenin Peace Prize, which was awarded to citizens rather than to citizens of the Soviet Union. Also, the Lenin Prize should not be confused with the Stalin Prize or the later USSR State Prize, some persons were awarded both the Lenin Prize and the USSR State Prize. Note, This list is incomplete, short, and differs in detail from the complete and much longer Russian list,1958 year Alexander M. Andrianov Lev Andreevich Artsimovich Olga A. Bazilevskaya Stanislav I. Braginskiy Igor N. Golovin Mikhail A. Leontovich Stepan Yu, lukyanov Samuil M. Osovets Vasiliy I. Sinitsin Nikolay V. Filippov Natan A. Yavlinskiy For research of powerful pulse discharges in gas for production of the high-temperature plasma,1964 year Aleksandr Emmanuilovich Nudelman For a series of innovative automatic cannons. 1966 year Yuri Raizer 1972 year Vsevolod A. Belyaev Oleg Borisovich Firsov For a series of work Elementary processes, utkin 1982 year Viktor V. Orlov For the work on fast neutron reactors. 1984 year Valentin F. Demichev For production of chemical compounds. Kadomtsev Oleg P. Pogutse Vitaliy D. Shafranov For a series of work The theory of thermonuclear toroidal plasma,1976 year Nikolai Krasovski Alexander B. Kurzhanski Yury Osipov A. Subbotin 1965 year Sergei S. Nadezhda A. Agaltsova

13.
De Beers
–
The De Beers Group of Companies has a leading role in the diamond exploration, diamond mining, diamond retail, diamond trading and industrial diamond manufacturing sectors. The company is active in open-pit, large-scale alluvial, coastal. The company operates in 28 countries and mining takes place in Botswana, Namibia, South Africa, until the start of the 21st century, De Beers effectively had total control over the diamond market as both a monopoly and monopsony of diamonds. The company was founded in 1888 by British businessman Cecil Rhodes, who was financed by the South African diamond magnate Alfred Beit and the London-based N M Rothschild & Sons bank. In 1926, Ernest Oppenheimer, a German immigrant to Britain who had earlier founded mining giant Anglo American plc with American financier J. P. Morgan, was elected to the board of De Beers. He built and consolidated the companys global monopoly over the industry until his death in 1957. After they discovered diamonds on their land, the demands of the British government forced them to sell their farm on July 31,1871. Vooruitzicht would become the site of the Big Hole and the De Beer Mine and their name, which was given to one of the mines, subsequently became associated with the company. He invested the profits of this operation into buying up claims of small mining operators and he soon secured funding from the Rothschild family, who would finance his business expansion. The agreement soon proved to be very successful — for example during the slump of 1891–1892. The Second Boer War proved to be a time for the company. Kimberley was besieged as soon as war broke out, thereby threatening the companys valuable mines, in 1898, diamonds were discovered on farms near Pretoria, Transvaal. One led to the discovery of the Premier Mine, the Premier Mine was registered in 1902 and the Cullinan Diamond, the largest rough diamond ever discovered, was found there in 1905. However, its owner refused to join the De Beers cartel, instead, the mine started selling to a pair of independent dealers named Bernhard and Ernest Oppenheimer, thereby weakening the De Beers cartel. Francis Oats, who became chairman of De Beers in 1908, was dismissive of the threats from the Premier Mine, however, production soon equalled all of the De Beers mines combined. Ernest Oppenheimer was appointed the agent for the powerful London Syndicate. During World War I, the Premier Mine was finally absorbed into De Beers, when Rhodes died in 1902, De Beers controlled 90% of the worlds diamond production. Ernest Oppenheimer took over the chairmanship of the company in 1929, after buying shares, Oppenheimer was very concerned about the discovery of diamonds in 1908 in German South West Africa, fearing that the increased supply would swamp the market and force prices down

14.
South Africa
–
South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa, is the southernmost country in Africa. South Africa is the 25th-largest country in the world by land area and it is the southernmost country on the mainland of the Old World or the Eastern Hemisphere. About 80 percent of South Africans are of Sub-Saharan African ancestry, divided among a variety of ethnic groups speaking different Bantu languages, the remaining population consists of Africas largest communities of European, Asian, and multiracial ancestry. South Africa is a multiethnic society encompassing a variety of cultures, languages. Its pluralistic makeup is reflected in the recognition of 11 official languages. The country is one of the few in Africa never to have had a coup détat, however, the vast majority of black South Africans were not enfranchised until 1994. During the 20th century, the black majority sought to recover its rights from the dominant white minority, with this struggle playing a role in the countrys recent history. The National Party imposed apartheid in 1948, institutionalising previous racial segregation, since 1994, all ethnic and linguistic groups have held political representation in the countrys democracy, which comprises a parliamentary republic and nine provinces. South Africa is often referred to as the Rainbow Nation to describe the multicultural diversity. The World Bank classifies South Africa as an economy. Its economy is the second-largest in Africa, and the 34th-largest in the world, in terms of purchasing power parity, South Africa has the seventh-highest per capita income in Africa. However, poverty and inequality remain widespread, with about a quarter of the population unemployed, nevertheless, South Africa has been identified as a middle power in international affairs, and maintains significant regional influence. The name South Africa is derived from the geographic location at the southern tip of Africa. Upon formation the country was named the Union of South Africa in English, since 1961 the long form name in English has been the Republic of South Africa. In Dutch the country was named Republiek van Zuid-Afrika, replaced in 1983 by the Afrikaans Republiek van Suid-Afrika, since 1994 the Republic has had an official name in each of its 11 official languages. Mzansi, derived from the Xhosa noun umzantsi meaning south, is a name for South Africa. South Africa contains some of the oldest archaeological and human fossil sites in the world, extensive fossil remains have been recovered from a series of caves in Gauteng Province. The area is a UNESCO World Heritage site and has termed the Cradle of Humankind

15.
Udachnaya pipe
–
The Udachnaya pipe is a diamond deposit in the Daldyn-Alakit kimberlite field in Sakha Republic, Russia. It is a mine, and is located just outside the Arctic circle at 66°26′N 112°19′E. Udachnaya was discovered on June 15,1955, just two days after the discovery of the diamond pipe Mir by Soviet geologist Vladimir Shchukin and his team and it is more than 600 metres deep, making it the third deepest open-pit mine in the world. The nearby settlement of Udachny is named for the deposit, as of 2010, Udachnaya pipe is controlled by Russian diamond company Alrosa, which planned to halt open-pit mining in favor of underground mining in 2010. The mine has estimated reserves of 225.8 million carats of diamonds, Mir mine Volcanic pipe Satellite photo of the Udachnaya pipe Alexeev, Sergey V, Alexander V. Drozdov, Tatyana I. The First Experience of Saline Drainage Waters Disposal from the Udachnaya Pipe Quarry into Permaforest, institute of Arctic and Alpine Research, University of Colorado at Boulder

16.
International Standard Book Number
–
The International Standard Book Number is a unique numeric commercial book identifier. An ISBN is assigned to each edition and variation of a book, for example, an e-book, a paperback and a hardcover edition of the same book would each have a different ISBN. The ISBN is 13 digits long if assigned on or after 1 January 2007, the method of assigning an ISBN is nation-based and varies from country to country, often depending on how large the publishing industry is within a country. The initial ISBN configuration of recognition was generated in 1967 based upon the 9-digit Standard Book Numbering created in 1966, the 10-digit ISBN format was developed by the International Organization for Standardization and was published in 1970 as international standard ISO2108. Occasionally, a book may appear without a printed ISBN if it is printed privately or the author does not follow the usual ISBN procedure, however, this can be rectified later. Another identifier, the International Standard Serial Number, identifies periodical publications such as magazines, the ISBN configuration of recognition was generated in 1967 in the United Kingdom by David Whitaker and in 1968 in the US by Emery Koltay. The 10-digit ISBN format was developed by the International Organization for Standardization and was published in 1970 as international standard ISO2108, the United Kingdom continued to use the 9-digit SBN code until 1974. The ISO on-line facility only refers back to 1978, an SBN may be converted to an ISBN by prefixing the digit 0. For example, the edition of Mr. J. G. Reeder Returns, published by Hodder in 1965, has SBN340013818 -340 indicating the publisher,01381 their serial number. This can be converted to ISBN 0-340-01381-8, the check digit does not need to be re-calculated, since 1 January 2007, ISBNs have contained 13 digits, a format that is compatible with Bookland European Article Number EAN-13s. An ISBN is assigned to each edition and variation of a book, for example, an ebook, a paperback, and a hardcover edition of the same book would each have a different ISBN. The ISBN is 13 digits long if assigned on or after 1 January 2007, a 13-digit ISBN can be separated into its parts, and when this is done it is customary to separate the parts with hyphens or spaces. Separating the parts of a 10-digit ISBN is also done with either hyphens or spaces, figuring out how to correctly separate a given ISBN number is complicated, because most of the parts do not use a fixed number of digits. ISBN issuance is country-specific, in that ISBNs are issued by the ISBN registration agency that is responsible for country or territory regardless of the publication language. Some ISBN registration agencies are based in national libraries or within ministries of culture, in other cases, the ISBN registration service is provided by organisations such as bibliographic data providers that are not government funded. In Canada, ISBNs are issued at no cost with the purpose of encouraging Canadian culture. In the United Kingdom, United States, and some countries, where the service is provided by non-government-funded organisations. Australia, ISBNs are issued by the library services agency Thorpe-Bowker

17.
American Museum of Natural History
–
The American Museum of Natural History, located on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, New York City, is one of the largest museums in the world. The museum has a scientific staff of 225, sponsors over 120 special field expeditions each year. Before construction of the present complex, the museum was housed in the Arsenal building in Central Park. Sherman, A. G. Phelps Dodge, William A. Haines, Charles A. Dana, Joseph H. Choate, Henry G. Stebbins, Henry Parish, the founding of the museum realized the dream of naturalist Dr. Albert S. Bickmore. Bickmore, a student of Harvard zoologist Louis Agassiz, lobbied tirelessly for years for the establishment of a natural history museum in New York. In 1874, the cornerstone was laid for the museums first building, the original Victorian Gothic building, which was opened in 1877, was designed by J. Wrey Mould, both already closely identified with the architecture of Central Park. The original building was eclipsed by the south range of the museum, designed by J. Cleaveland Cady. It extends 700 feet along West 77th Street, with corner towers 150 feet tall and its pink brownstone and granite, similar to that found at Grindstone Island in the St. Lawrence River, came from quarries at Picton Island, New York. The entrance on Central Park West, the New York State Memorial to Theodore Roosevelt and it leads to a vast Roman basilica, where visitors are greeted with a cast of a skeleton of a rearing Barosaurus defending her young from an Allosaurus. The museum is accessible through its 77th street foyer, renamed the Grand Gallery. The hall leads into the oldest extant exhibit in the museum, since 1930, little has been added to the exterior of the original building. The architect Kevin Roche and his firm Roche-Dinkeloo have been responsible for the planning of the museum since the 1990s. Various renovations both interior and exterior have been carried out including improvements to Dinosaur Hall and mural restoration in Roosevelt Memorial Hall, in 1992 the firm designed the new eight story AMNH Library. The museums south façade, spanning 77th Street from Central Park West to Columbus Avenue was cleaned, repaired and re-emerged in 2009, steven Reichl, a spokesman for the museum, said that work would include restoring 650 black-cherry window frames and stone repairs. The museums consultant on the latest renovation is Wiss, Janney, Elstner Associates, Inc. an architectural and engineering firm with headquarters in Northbrook, the museums first two presidents were John David Wolfe and Robert L. Stuart, both among the museums founders. The museum was not put on a sound footing until the appointment of the president, Morris K. Jesup. Jesup was president for over 25 years, overseeing its expansion, the fourth president, Henry Fairfield Osborn, was appointed in 1906 on the death of Jesup. Osborn consolidated the museums expansion, developing it into one of the worlds foremost natural history museums, F. Trubee Davison was president from 1933 to 1951, with A. Perry Osborn as Acting President from 1941 to 1946